


The Iron Game

by Anonymous



Category: Carmilla (Web Series), Carmilla - All Media Types
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - World War II, Alternate Universe- No Supernatural, Communism, F/F, Nazis, Not entirely sure where I'm going with this, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-04
Updated: 2016-06-05
Packaged: 2018-07-12 03:54:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7084603
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Laura Hollis joined with the Red Cross, she did not expect find herself a prisoner of the Nazi armies. She certainly didn't expect to fall for a raven haired German girl unfortunately entangled in a treacherous political game. </p><p>Even in the best of times, young love is inevitably beset by obstacles, whether they be inexperience, parental disapproval, or Soviet plots for world domination.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Baptism by Fire

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have never written romance so let's see how this pans out, I guess (probably not well).
> 
> I like history a lot but World War II is not my area of expertise; inaccuracies will abound. If you are a WWII buff this story may be hazardous to your health.

This was not the way Laura Hollis expected to die. Intellectually, she’d known it was a very real possibility, but on a more basic level, she’d never really grasped the danger she willingly placed herself in.  

She looked up at the grey winter sky swirling with dark, ugly clouds that threatened either rain or snowfall. Neither would be particularly welcome at the moment, as Laura crouched inside the ruined skeleton of a burnt out country house. It was probably very pretty once, a little picturesque home in an equally idyllic village nestled deep in the French forest. It might have looked like something out of a fairy tale.

But reality has a way of crushing fairy tales.

The entire village burned. The ancient church in the center of town, one that had withstood all the violent centuries past, was engulfed in flame. The cross at the building’s apex deformed in the intense heat, wrought iron bowing in defeat as the fire reduced it to liquid. Corpses littered the street, those of civilian and soldier alike. Just two or three meters outside of Laura’s pitiful hiding place lay the savaged body of what was until very recently a pleasant young man from Quebec. His face was burnt away by the flash of an artillery shell, leaving only a charred skull decorated with strips of melted skin in its wake. His helmet was subjected to such heat that it dripped in beads of molten steel, scorching into and binding with his scalp.

Laura looked away, bile rising in her throat. The house in which she took refuge was one of the few in town not burning, though it had been until recently. Large chunks of the roof caved in, offering a clear view of the stormy sky above. The entire southern wall of the little building was gone, and Laura only hoped no one approached from that direction. She hugged her knees to her chest, cowering behind a buckling doorframe. The door itself was god-knows-where.

 _Maybe,_ she considered bitterly, _the house will cave and kill me before they find me._

She closed her eyes and saw her father’s weathered face. His mouth was turned down, accentuating the lines of premature age that marked his cheeks. An ugly scar of knotted flesh ran down his right cheek, courtesy of a German bayonet on the Somme all those years ago. He sported the mark all of Laura’s life, and to her it was as much a part of him as his eyes or his thinning blond hair. He’d urged her not to go, offering up the darkest stories he had collected during his time in the last Great War, urging her to remember that with her mother gone, she was all he had left. It had been to no avail. Laura was adamant. She would _help_ people. She would do something truly meaningful. People who might otherwise have died would live because of her. He could not stop her in the end. Her father had bit back tears and hugged her tightly before she turned and walked out of the safe provincial home she’d known all her life and into a paroxysm of death and horror unparalleled in human history.

Laura looked around again. She looked to the mutilated corpse in front of the house. She looked to the homes and shops reduced to ashes. She hears a scream somewhere, and then a shout, and then gunfire. She hears the snapping of burning wood.

Helping people.

There was a bad joke. There was so much pain, so much blood, and so much misery. In this town alone, in this little nameless French village, she’d seen things so much worse than anything she’d ever imagined possible. Then it struck her that this-and worse-was taking place the world over. How could one woman be of any help? How could _anyone_ help? How could anyone take away even an iota of that pain, or wipe away even a drop of all that blood?

She heard the drum of soldiers’ boots somewhere off to her right. There was barely time to think before a section of already brittle wall caved in and three German soldiers forced their way through the crumbling doorframe. Laura scuttled backwards amidst an explosion of splinters and ashes. Eyes wide with fear, she threw her hands up before her, as if that would be of any help.

With the barrels of three ugly submachine guns leveled directly at her face, Laura’s mind was blank. She could process nothing except her imminent death. Every basic instinct screamed to do something, _anything,_ to extract herself from this mess, but she was entirely deprived of her logical faculties and given over entirely to terror. The soldiers conversed in German. She had picked up a word or two of the language here and there from prisoners of war, mostly, but she could understand nothing of what they said.

“ _Ich bin…r-rotes Kreuz!”_ she offered in desperation, pointing to the red cross sewn over her heart. One of the soldiers reached down and grabbed her roughly round the wrist, yanking her to her feet. Red Cross personnel and other non-combatants were to be spared of course, as per the rules of warfare, but militaries were hardly known for following international law to the letter.

They dragged her from the house with far from gentle handling, and started down the little road that ran down the center of the village. Laura tried to keep her eyes to the ground, not wishing to look upon the carnage any more than necessary. She wasn’t sure how many, if any, of the battalion to which she’d been attached had survived, or how long they’d live from here onwards in German hands. Hauled by her captors down two or three alleyways, they came to the town square, where the rest of the German forces had massed after clearing the town of enemy personnel. Two military trucks sat parked before the burning church, their beds stuffed with captured Canadian soldiers. Two or three Germans guarded each load of disarmed men. The man who held her wrist released it, confident she would not be so foolish as to run.

He gave what sounded like a command to the other two, and then jerked a thumb in the direction of the trucks. In short order, she was again seized, by the upper arm this time, and dragged towards the waiting flatbed.

“Hey-wait!” she protested. “I’m not a soldier, you ca-“

“Shut up” the soldier grunted in sharp, hard English.

Undeterred, Laura forged on; “I’m not a prisoner of war! There are laws th-“

He yanked on her arm and brought his face uncomfortably close to hers. Mouth twisted into a cruel smile, he threatened; “You get in the truck, or I throw you in the truck. Understand?”

Not wishing to suffer the indignity of being physically forced inside, she shot the German a withering glare and climbed in herself.

“Thanks for complying.” He offered, still wearing that mocking smile. Laura wished to God there were something heavy she could throw at him. Instead, he chuckled and walked away.

Laura sighed and turned to examine her surroundings and the other prisoners they held. There were about fifteen besides her, some nursing ugly wounds, others sitting in a dreadful silence, faces stony in defeat.

The truck roared to life.

“Laura?”

She looked up and smiled. The face of Corporal Wilson Kirsch looked back at her from the other end of the truck bed. She had met him for the first time on the trip across the Channel months ago. Abrasive and obnoxious as he might be on occasion, he’d helped ease the shock of being thrust headfirst into the epicenter of a war. He was a friend, or as close to one as she had. The boiling dread in her gut subsided ever so slightly.

“Kirsch! I wasn’t sure if you’d…”

“For now” came the sardonic voice of another captured soldier. “Let’s see what happens when this truck stops.”

The Germans, having finished with the village, abandoned it. With a jump, the truck filled with prisoners of war trundled along and plunged into the French forest. The hiss of flames became ever quieter until it faded entirely. As much as she did not wish to, Laura could not help but throw a look over her shoulder one more time. She did so just in time to see the church finally give way and collapse in a wave of ash and fire.

The heavens growled with ominous intent.

The rain began to fall.

 

* * *

 

Lilita Morgan bent over her oak escritoire, hand moving ceaselessly as she penned letter after letter in her flowing, crisp and rigid script. She did not work with such fervor to meet a deadline, or because some other urgency compelled her, but for the simple reason that she was in high spirits. In fact, she was happier than she had been in many, many years. The open bottle of wine on her desk testified to that, for she rarely drank. It was as if a great stone had been lifted from her shoulders, or a hideous wound miraculously healed. Lilita knew she had been right to keep the faith. Even in the darkest hours, when the Nazi victory seemed a grim inevitability, she had soldiered on.

The Fascists were on the ropes, the eastern nations cleansed of the invader’s foul presence by the oncoming Red Army. Hitler’s Reich was well and truly doomed, no matter what shrill propaganda the party trumpeted from radio and street corner. Soon the last twelve years would be a distant memory. The architects and executioners of the regime would swing from ropes.

Lilita took a sip of wine.

The Nazis had succeeded in upsetting and nearly undoing all of the carefully laid plans she and hers had worked so hard to prepare and carry out. The attack on the Soviet Union had come as something of a surprise. For a time, it had seemed as if the end had truly come. All of their labors would be reduced to ashes. But, oh, glorious day! The invader was driven back, and the sun of hope burned bright once again. Victory was imminent-and inevitable. The western liberal democracies did exactly as they were meant to, and played their parts just as required. They would be dealt with in due time. The ultimate triumph was not cancelled, merely postponed.

She took another sip of her wine. It was delicious.

Red wine.

Red was the color of victory.

 

* * *

 

The truck sputtered to a stop at the edge of a sprawling, overgrown field surrounded by towering woods. An old, rotting farmhouse was the only sign of any human habitation, past or present. Based on its deteriorated condition and the unattended meadow, Laura guessed it had been abandoned for a long time, since the fall of France at least.

Thirty minutes or so from the burning village, the two vehicles transporting POWs, along with another two carrying only German personnel, had split off from the rest of the convoy (which presumably aimed to return to the front and carry on fighting). After a brief stop in another town, a quick ride down an idyllic forest path ended at this field.

Laura had little idea where they might be, but the ubiquitous German she’d heard spoken in the last town told her that if they were not in the country itself, they were at least very near its border.

The German infantrymen poured out from their transports onto the field. Laura figured there to be about twelve or thirteen. The driver of their truck leapt out, slamming the door so hard the entire vehicle shook. He shot his prisoners a glare, and joined another man, tall, thin, and marked as an officer by the insignia on his cap and uniform. The two men chatted, just far enough that even if Laura had been a fluent German speaker, she probably couldn’t have made out anything they said. The officer pointed to the trucks, then to the old farmhouse. The driver nodded. A stream of words poured from his mouth. Laura was clueless, yet despite the barrier posed by language and distance, she was able to pick something out.

“ _Das Mädchen”_ which Laura understood to mean ‘the girl’ and which considering the composition of present company, could only refer to her. She had no idea of the context, but special attention of any form could mean nothing good.

The officer nodded.

The driver jogged back over to the truck and yanked the bed open. He whistled, summoning four soldiers to his side. Counting silently, he picked six prisoners from the truck. Singling them out with quick jabs of the index finger, he motioned for them to follow.

“You six. Come on.”

The six men indicated exchanged suspicious glances. Clearly not keen to obey, it seemed for a moment as if they might defy their captor. Instead, his four troops raised their guns and trained them on the non-compliant Canadians. Deciding potential death was better than certain death they stood with reluctance and filed out of the truck. The officer looked on as Driver and his four gunmen marched the six unfortunates towards the farmhouse, guarding them as a shepherd dog does a flock of sheep. As they shrank into the distance, and finally vanished into the dilapidated old building, a sharp pang of fear cut through Laura’s stomach. She’d tried to deny it to herself as long as she was able. It was impossible to do so any more. This was clearly and undeniably a measured mass execution. The Nazi strike through the Ardennes had taken the Allied invaders off guard, but for all its masterful direction it could only delay the enemy push into Germany. Time, space, and men were precious commodities among the forces of the Reich. They could not afford prisoners. She looked around at her fellow prisoners. Surely they must see it as well? Their faces, by and large, were blank masks. Some failed to wipe away blood or long dried tears. She looked to Kirsch. He met her gaze, but said nothing, lips pursed.

Two soldiers still guarded their truck, and those not attending to the doomed six in the farmhouse stood watch in the field, not twenty meters away. Discussing their present situation within earshot of their jailers would be unwise.

Laura looked to Kirsch again. Much to her chagrin, he was not looking at her. She shook her head from side to side in a bid for his attention. When this failed, she waved her hands about in some odd jazz hands-like gesture, careful to keep them below the edge of the truck bed, careful that their guards did not see. This time, he noticed. Laura pointed towards the farmhouse then dragged a finger across her throat. Kirsch furrowed his brow and shook his head. Laura rolled her eyes. Gesturing again to the house, she shaped her fingers into a rough imitation of a pistol and squeezed off a few imaginary shots.

As if on cue, the sound of _real_ gunfire erupted from the farmhouse, tearing across the field like a blast of thunder. Kirsch’s eyes went wide. He got it now. So did the rest of them. Laura waited. A moment passed. Nothing happened. She was incredulous, and did what she could to express this without a word. Would they simply wait to be slaughtered like cattle?

The vehicle was flanked, one soldier guarding each side.

Laura snuck a peak over the wall of the bed. The prisoners watched her with curiosity. The next time the German playing sentry at the truck’s right flank turned away, Laura struck out and kicked him in the head. He stumbled forward, shocked, swearing loudly. Trying in vain to right himself, he instead pitched and went sprawling into the overgrown grass, MP40 falling from his hands. Laura leapt out of the truck, closed the ten feet between her and the weapon, and plucked it from the ground.

Time slowed. She’d never held a weapon before in her life. The firearm felt disgustingly heavy in her hands. The soldier she’d kicked regained his bearings, and shot upright like a jackrabbit. He spun around to face her, eyes burning. No more than seven feet lay between them. Eager to retrieve his gun and avenge his humiliation, he charged. Hardly thinking, mind racing with fear, desperation, and the rush of adrenaline, Laura hooked a finger around the trigger and fired. The bullet seemed to rip the air before her in half like a rock through still water. It tore into the German’s neck and his blood fanned out in a fantastic fountain. He folded, falling to the ground like a sack of stones. A still beating heart pumped precious lifeblood out through the ugly wound, painting the grass red with regular sprays of gore. Laura, so caught up was she in the horror and exhilaration of what she’d done, hardly noticed the second guardsman round the truck, gun in hand. He gave a shout, and raised the firearm. Laura turned to find herself staring down the barrel of a Luger leveled directly at her chest.

Before he could let any rounds loose, Kirsch reached out and slammed the German’s head against the hubcap of the truck.

All after that moment happened rather quickly. Encouraged by this small show of resistance, the Canadians poured from their trucks, to be met with the fire of those German soldiers waiting in the field, and that of those returning from the bloody execution in the farmhouse.

Gunfire and shouting, in German and English mingled together into one uniform blast. Nazi weapons, wielded by their intended users and by the hitherto prisoners alike, felled man after man.

Laura’s world shrunk, blocking out the screams and shouts, and demanding she focus single-mindedly on the tree line that offered refuge and potential escape. She dropped the MP40, summoned up each iota of strength in her power, and dashed for the forest. A bullet, meant for her or not, whistled past her and cut a nasty gash across her right shoulder. Blood hissed from the wound and stained the forest ground beneath her feet. Still, she ran. Her Red Cross uniform caught on tore and branches, rocks, and weeds. She continued on, until the din of the field became a whisper, and the sounds of war overwhelmed by those of the wood.

When Laura stopped running, it was all she could do not to keel over dead from exhaustion. Her heart thrummed wildly in her chest. Blood surged through her veins and roared in her ears, sending her head spinning. The adrenaline that powered her killing of the German soldier and her mad race from the scene now evaporated, and her knees went weak. She collapsed, body shaking. Simply flopping over onto her back took such Herculean strength the uninterrupted dash through the woods only minutes earlier seemed impossible, something only a superhuman could have accomplished. Laura lay there, looking up at the tree canopy and tracing what snippets of sky shone through thick leaves. The energy drained from her weary limbs, seeping into the forest floor. Too tired to realize she had no idea where she was, and too tired to care even if she did, her eyes fluttered closed, and within seconds she was asleep.

 

* * *

 

“Hey. Hey! Laura!”

Laura snapped awake with a shout.

Kirsch jumped back, startled.

“Wow! Calm down! It’s me!”

“God, Kirsch.” She rose to her feet, cautiously. The sun began to sink, leaving the forest painted in dull oranges and reds. Laura saw no sign of anyone but the two of them. “Did anyone else…”

He shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so.” Laura buried her face in her hands. Kirsch coughed. “I uh…I don’t want to make things worse but uh…do you…like…have any idea where we actually are right now?”

 

* * *

 

After roughly two hours of wandering aimlessly through the forests of eastern France (or western Germany; they still had yet to come across anything that might offer a clue as to which side of the border they were on), the pair had the good fortune to stumble upon a stream. As age old folk wisdom dictated, water generally meant civilization. With no better prospects, the two elected to follow the little creek for a ways, at least. Anyway, the calming sound of water rushing through an unspoiled wilderness did wonders for frayed nerves.

“So…why are you over here anyway?”

Laura kicked a rock into the stream.

“Because I wanted to help people.”

“That’s it?”

“Alright, since we’re probably going to starve to death in the woods anyway…I always wanted to be a journalist. That never panned out, so I figured this was my best shot to get out and see the world. Even if it is currently being torn to pieces by the worst war in history.”

“Don’t worry, this war will be over soon.” He flashed her a smile. “That’s a promise.”

Laura rolled  her eyes. “Thanks, Kirsch. That makes me feel a lot better.”

“No problem. When we get to Berlin I’m gonna personally shoot Hitler in the face.” He mimed doing just that.

“We’re not getting to Berlin.”

“You don’t think we’re gonna lose do you?” He asked, giving her a look of concern.

“No, it’s just that the Russians are going to take Berlin.”

“Man, no way! We can’t let the freaking Commies have the enemy capital! That-“

Laura gestured for silence.

“Wait, Kirsch. Look.”

There, barely visible through the twisted branches, was a well-worn footpath.

“Yes!” he rejoices.

Laura could not keep the smile from her own face. “Well, shall we?”

* * *

 

The town was about as large as the last one, but significantly more modern. The road was paved, if poorly. The fashion was only twenty or thirty years out of date instead of a century. A little telegraph office sat comfortably between a tailor’s shop and an inn.

Laura and Kirsch stepped from the dark of the wood into the gas lit streets of this nameless little village. From the instant, the olive Canadian army uniform and the distinctive outfit of a Red Cross volunteer drew stares from what few people remain on the street at this time. Thanks to the timely tolling of the church bell, Laura knew ‘this time to be roughly 9:00 PM.

“God I hope there are no soldiers in this town.”

“So…what do we…”

“The telegraph office? I think that’s what that is. If they’re open. I really, really hope so.” Laura says.

Kirsch shrugged and followed his much shorter companion as she jogged across the pitiful excuse for a main street and ascended the steps to the little building. The windows were dark, betraying no hint of movement inside.

“Dammit.” Laura mumbled. She thumped against the front door, more out of frustration than any real attempt to knock. To her surprise, it opened. Hanging slightly ajar, the door swung back and forth in a laze. “Huh…”

Kirsch prodded the door with his boot, and stepped gingerly inside, Laura trailing behind.

“Hello?” She called out. “Anyone in here?”

The interior consisted of three rooms, though what the back two held was of little importance to them, for the telegraph itself was located here in the anteroom.

“Do you know how to send a telegraph?” Laura asked.

Kirsch shrugged hopelessly.

“Well, alright” she sighed in defeat. “Let’s see if we can figure this out…” She reached out towards the device with great care, as if she might accidentally shatter it and strand them here forever.

“You’ve never used one of those before, have you?”

Both turned in unison at the sudden and unexpected voice. Acting on instinct, Kirsch moved to raise his gun before remembering he did not actually possess one at the moment.

Someone stepped out from one of the back rooms, a girl, by the looks of it. Laura drew back.

“Who are you?” Kirsch demands.

“Easy soldier” responded a raven-haired young woman possessed of one of the loveliest faces Laura had ever seen. “I’m not gonna shoot you. Well, probably.”

He stepped back, eyeing the stranger with caution. She, in return, joined Laura at the telegraph.

“So, who are you contacting? Are you just homesick or is this something more serious?”

Laura stared into a pair of big, feline brown eyes and follows a graceful jaw line down to a pair of perfect lips, then up again to what must be the greatest cheekbones in this village, if not all Germany.

“I uh-I was…I’m sorry…you…who are you?”

The girl flashed a playful smile that lights up her dark eyes.

“You can call me Carmilla, sweetheart.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Woah look at that I completed a chapter and it's longer than 1000 words. 
> 
> I intend to have most of the characters from the show make appearances at some point or another (and a lot will be important to the plot) but I haven't decided all of their roles yet, in keeping with the time and setting. Totally open to suggestions. 
> 
> Some archive warnings may end up having to be applied later in the story. It is wartime, after all. 
> 
> I hope I do okay with keeping everyone at least reasonably in character, which is always a challenge with AUs.


	2. New Management

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which two Canadians make the acquaintance of a certain German, and a scientist gets a new job.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning; there's some brief misgendering in this chapter.

_“My son, if you wish to be a war criminal become a scientist as well. It’s the only way to avoid repercussions these days.”_

_~_ Anonymous

 

* * *

 

 

The clock tower announced 10:00 PM in the distance, the bell’s rich cadence shaking the little town on its foundations. Night had settled heavy over the countryside.

 Laura Hollis was still reeling from the events of the past twenty-four hours. In the space of a day, she’d been caught in a massive Nazi counteroffensive, suffered the destruction of the battalion to which she was attached, taken prisoner, nearly executed by German soldiers, and fled for hours through a dark forest without compass or map. Now, tired, hungry, thirsty, and quite fed up with the European war, she stood in the telegraph office of some irrelevant little Franco-German town with a communication device she had no idea how to use, the only other survivor of the extra-legal massacre she’d escaped, and a very pretty young woman who’d introduced herself as Carmilla.

 “Well…um..hello Carmilla. It’s…it’s nice to meet you. Or…considering the circumstances…”

 Carmilla gestured towards Kirsch. “Your friend might want to get rid of his uniform. We are in Germany, after all.”

 “So we _are_ in Germany!” Laura took away. “Do you know where we are, exactly?”

 “You are in a town called Hofburg. Not _that_ Hofburg.” Laura nodded, unsure what other, apparently more famous Hofburg she was talking about. “This is the Hofburg a few miles from Bonn. It’s an irrelevant town that no one cares about. Doesn’t matter.”

 “So then…” Kirsch questioned. “Why are you here?”

 She shoots him a glare and turns back to Laura. “Alright, move, love, I need to do something here.”

 She elbows Laura aside and bends over the telegraph.

 “Hey!” Laura protests.

 Just as Carmilla prepared to send her message, the attentions of all three were refocused by a loud crash and the sound of splintering wood. Peering out onto the streets, Laura’s heart sunk. A group of German troops fanned out, taking to houses in groups of three or two. The time it took to deliver two curt knocks was all any poor villager had to answer his unwelcome visitors before the soldiers grew impatient and kicked in the door.

 “They found us!” Laura whispered. “We have to go!”

 “Yeah but-what about her?” Kirsch asked.

 “What about her?”

 “What if she tells?” Laura considered this for a moment. The erstwhile soldier turned to Carmilla. “Sorry babe, but you’re gonna have to come with us.”

 Carmilla reached into her skirts, and pulled a Tokarev from a hidden holster.

 “Oh, what the f-“ he started.

 “No, _you_ have to come with _me_.”

 Laura’s eyes went wide.

 “No! Please don’t turn us in! We don-“

 “I’m not gonna-they’re looking for me!” Carmilla snapped.

 “You? They’re looking for us! Why would they be looking for you? Why do you have a gun?”

 Out on the streets, three German soldiers surrounded a terrified old woman. She mumbled something, and then pointed towards the telegraph office.

 “Too many questions.” Carmilla aimed the pistol at Laura, and then at Kirsch, as if to demonstrate her willingness to shoot either one. “Out the back, come on.” She gestured with the gun towards the back rooms.

 “What the hell is going on?” Kirsch asked, at a loss.

 “Just go!” the German snapped, leveling the weapon at him again.

 He shook his head in disbelief and starts for the back, Laura in tow, and Carmilla behind her, gun trained squarely on the backs of her two new ‘companions’.

 They burst through the office’s back entrance and into fresh air just as the soldiers come to the front door.

 “ _Wo sind sie?”_ Comes the angry shout from within the building. Carmilla points them to a small shed, or more specifically a stack of lumber adjacent to it.

 “Go. There.”

 “We’re no-“

 “I will shoot you!”

 The two Canadians comply. As they hide behind the pile of wood, Carmilla flattens herself against the wall next to the still open back door, pistol held in her right hand and braced with her left. Inside, their pursuers tear the poor office apart, yelling all the while. Finally, when the place has been well and truly turned upside down, one of them notices the open back door.

 “ _Raus_!”

 Three soldiers filed out of the building, none of them noticing Carmilla. Once they were all safely outside, she raised the Tokarev and fired once, punching a hole clean through a steel helmet and into its wearer’s brains. The bullet did not exit, but bounces around within the poor bastard’s skull, turning tissue and muscle into a fine, bloody porridge. He struck the ground, twitching. His two companions wheeled about. One rushed Carmilla, flipping his rifle around and sending the stock hurtling towards her head. Before it could contact, she ducked forward, pressed the barrel of the gun into his gut, and fired at point blank range. The soldier stumbled back as his grey tunic stains a bright red. Carmilla reached out, grabbed him by the belt, and pulled him close to her, just in time for the last remaining trooper’s bullet to lodge itself in his shoulder, rather than in Carmilla’s throat. She aimed around her human shield and pulled the trigger again, striking the man in the ribs. He grunted in pain and dropped his rifle, hand flying to the wound in his side. Carmilla put the next bullet right between his eyes. He hit the ground limp, like a marionette.

Carmilla abandoned the butchery without a second glance, collecting a speechless Kirsch and Laura as she headed back into the forest.

 “What? No, come on! We just spend hours in there!” Kirsch protested

 “Don’t care!”

 The second trek through the wood took less than half the time of the first. Carmilla moved with purpose, slithering through the tangles of leaves and shrubbery like a great cat through his jungle. She threw regular glances over her shoulder to make certain her less than willing new traveling companions were still in tow.

 Laura and Kirsch struggled to keep pace with the girl, already exhausted as they were.

 “Come on…slow…down!” Kirsch huffed. Carmilla said nothing, but Laura could have sworn she actually increased her pace.

 “Do you know where you’re going?” Laura asked.

 “Yes! Now quit asking questions!”

The gash where the bullet had earlier grazed her still stung like hell, and every time she made a too sudden movement white hot pain shot through her shoulder and spread through her entire body.

“Why are we even following her?” Kirsch questioned in his best attempt at a whisper.

“Well…she does have a gun.” Laura offered. “Look she may be a German but she doesn’t seem to be a big fan of the current government from what we saw…back there.” Laura winced. She’d seen far too much blood and killing for one day.

After an eternity of marching through the wilderness, they came at last to a little clearing terminating in a small precipice overlooking a tiny lake-more of a pond. The cliff was hardly deserving of the name, either, at about twenty feet from base to peak. The sky above was still dark, and though Laura had no mechanism to know the time, she figured it must be around midnight or so. Carmilla sat down on a large, flat rock near the edge of the little cliff. Kirsch, grateful for the chance to finally stop moving, bent over, sucking in great gulps of air. Laura all but collapsed against a tree.

Carmilla pulled the Tokarev from its holster once more. “So, what to do with the two of you…” She aimed the gun at Laura, then at Kirsch. “I suppose I could just shoot you, that’d be easiest….”

Kirsch threw up his hands, eyes popping wide open. “Hey, woah! Listen ba-I mean, miss-I mean…look, we don’t even know who you are!”

“Yeah” Carmilla conceded. “But you know what I look like.”

“I have…a terrible memory?” Kirsch said, voice full of hope.

“ _Enough!”_ The German and the Corporal turned as one, taken off guard by the sudden outburst. Laura stood, hands balled into fists, all five feet and two inches shaking with a strange cross between rage, fear, and weariness. “Okay? This has been the _worst_ day of my life! I’ve been taken prisoner, shot at, and been chased through the woods by armed soldiers! I _killed_ a man today! I don’t even step on bugs and I _shot_ someone.” Her voice cracked, tears welling up in her eyes. “I am _not_ going to die in this damn forest! Do you hear me, Carla?”

Carmilla struggled to keep a small smile off of her face. She failed. She lowered the pistol ever so slightly. “It’s Carmilla, _schatzi_.”

Laura wiped a stray tear away, able to compose herself before breaking into full-blown sobbing. “Oh. S-sorry.”

Carmilla’s smile grew just a little wider. It was hard not to be at least marginally charmed by a girl who’d apologize for misremembering the name of someone who for all she knew might kill her on the spot.

“Do you either of you know the date?”

“December 23rd.” Answered Kirsch.

Carmilla holstered the Tokarev. “Actually, my muscular friend, it’s December 24th.”

“It’s Christmas Eve…” Laura mumbled, mostly to herself. She was struck with a pang of sadness. A part of wished she were back home, preparing for the Holiday with her father and what friends she had. They would be at the fireplace right now, with cups of hot cocoa in hand and maybe a handful of cookies. She sighs.

“That’s right.” Carmilla says, snapping Laura out of her reverie. “Mother always told me religion was the opiate of the masses, but it somehow seems less than right to gun the two of you down in cold blood on the eve of a holiday. So for the time being at least, you get to keep breathing.”

Both Canadians visibly relaxed.

“I knew a dame pretty as you couldn’t be all bad.” Kirsch said, grinning.

“Don’t push it, soldier.” She replied.

No one spoke for a good while. A few nocturnal birds chirped in the trees. An owl cried somewhere. The little pond swirled silently.

“Do you know where we are?” asked Laura, hoping not to be lost in the woods for the second time in a day.

“Yeah. About two miles east of the town we just vacated. I was heading to Bonn from here, but it looks like things have changed.” She stood, and walked over to Laura. Gripping the red cross stitched onto her lapel by a fraying corner, she yanked it away, taking a large strip of cloth with it. Balling it up, Carmilla tossed the little badge into the pond.

“Hey! What the heck?”

“If you’re traveling with me, then you aren’t wearing that badge everywhere.”

“Traveling with you? Why are we traveling with you?”

“Because, you’re going to take me to your lines. My original assignment is upset, thanks in no small part to you. Well, it’s the Wehrmacht’s fault more than it is yours, but regardless. The Nazis have got my scent now, and I’m not risking the trip to Bonn with their dogs hunting me all the way. So, you’re going to take me to the Allied lines, and I’ll walk into Bonn behind your tanks.”

“I don’t know where the Allied lines are!”

“Luckily” Carmilla said. “There are such things as maps.”

* * *

 

 “What did you mean by your original assignment?” Laura asked, as they once again moved through the German forest, west this time.

“What does it matter to you?” Carmilla snapped.

“Nothing I guess. Sorry.” Laura cast her eyes towards the ground.

Carmilla grimaced. An odd feeling stirred in her gut. Perhaps it was that strange and unwelcome beast known as guilt. It didn’t matter what she told them now, anyway, she supposed.

“I was meant to uncover the OKW’s plans in the west. Then, I was supposed to compile a report, which I _would_ have sent from the unfortunate telegraph office we met in. It looks like I’m too late, because apparently the Wehrmacht has already made its move.”

Laura eyed the girl she had reluctantly begun to consider a potential ally. As awful as this entire situation was, she could not deny that Carmilla’s words sent a little shiver down her spine. Military plans? Secret reports? Assignments? It was all like something out of the thriller novels Laura practically devoured by the dozen back home. An adventure full of espionage, action, and derring-do.

She wasn’t sure what OKW was, but it sounded cool and officialish and kind of scary. She had a sudden image of tall, thin men in clean crisp uniforms sitting round a table bathed in shadows, discussing their wicked designs and carefully plotting their next course of action.

_Stop it Laura! This is a war! People are dying!_

Still, the mystery of Carmilla intrigued her. Was she a resistance fighter? Laura knew they existed all over occupied Europe, but she hadn’t expected to actually meet one. A darker thought crept into her mind. She could be a Nazi agent, and this whole thing might be a ruse.

_No, if she wanted to kill you she’s had a dozen chances by now._

She pushed the thought from her mind, for the time being at least. Suddenly, it occurred to her that she hadn’t actually ever introduced herself. Even considering the circumstances that seemed rude.

“I’m Laura.” She blurted out suddenly. “Laura Hollis. Red Cross.” She tacked on quickly, as if to confer some authority upon her name. She pointed to Kirsch, who walked a few meters ahead of them. Well, at the moment he wasn’t so much walking as struggling to disentangle his boot from a nefarious clump of weeds. “That’s Kirsch. Well, Corporal Wilson Kirsch.”

Carmilla smiled. “The pleasure’s all mine, _Fraülein_ Hollis and _Gefreiter_ Kirsch.”

 

* * *

 

LaFontaine struck up a cigarette and lifted it to their lips. They were not a regular smoker, but the current situation could demand a cigarette from even the most collected of people. All manner of vehicles, military and civilian alike, streamed out of the facility and rolled westward towards the horizon. There was too much materiel and product for it all to be evacuated, and so the soldiers took only what could be easily and quickly carried on their retreat. The ‘workers’ watched with something between awe, fear, and satisfaction as their ‘employers’ fled like mice. From the hill on which their office sat, LaFontaine could see them. The laborers’ clothes were uniform, a drab set of grey trousers and overcoat, stained with oils and torn by heavy machinery. Some could hardly call what they wore so much as tatters. Their cheeks were sunken, dark circles highlighting dead, haunted eyes. Their eyes were the worst part. When they arrived, there was life in them, the spark of humanity. It rarely took long for the hours, days, and months to snuff it out. After a time, their eyes became shiny, reflective portals that revealed only a stark emptiness. It was said the eyes were the windows to the soul, but whatever souls these poor creatures ever had were stolen away from them along with their effects, names, and identities. These were the enemies of the Reich, inveterate foes of the German people, if the party was to be believed. LaFontaine could not bear to look into their eyes as they issued orders. They wondered if the laborers saw them as just another of their tormentors, or if they recognized LaFontaine was just as much a prisoner as they were. They enjoyed better quartering, of course. They were addressed with respect by German guards and party representatives. They would not have to worry about being dispatched with a single bullet to the head when their legs finally gave out. They even received a salary, though it was a small one. The true reward for their services was the privilege of keeping their life.

LaFontaine wondered if it had really been five years since the Nazis had marched into Paris. It didn’t seem possible, but it had to have been. It was 1945, and it had been five years since they had last seen their fatherland. They were a graduate of the University of Paris then. The Germans had come armed with a list of all those who might serve in some capacity the Reich’s war machine.

Their name had been on it.

It was an “offer of employment” ostensibly, but the hidden threat behind those innocuous words was painfully clear. The fall of 1940 found them en route to Silesia, where they’d spent almost all of the past five years, translating (or trying to) the insane and often downright impossible demands of the Nazi high command into weapons of war and a score of other appliances. As the situation on the front grew ever bleaker, the orders from Berlin became ever stranger and more desperate. When the Western Allies landed troops on the beaches of Normandy, the German military and its adjuncts had expanded their focus to include not only machinery and other forms of technology but also prospective modifications to the human body. It pained them to know the fruit of their labors was being used to carry on a war they wanted no part of, and even to maim and kill their own countrymen, but they too were only human in the end. They had no desire to die. But now, they felt a pang of hope. No one would dare admit it aloud, but the war was lost. The New Year rushed in, and it seemed it would bring with it the final collapse of the National Socialist regime. The war, God willing, would soon be at an end. Then, maybe LaFontaine could return home. Perhaps the poor wretches who worked to transform their schematics into tangible materiel could return home, too.

The Germans were abandoning this facility, like so many others in the east, in the face of the Soviet advance. Preferably, they would take everything along, to make certain nothing-and no one-of value fell into Russian hands. Time was of the essence, however. The guards would not share with them, but LaFontaine had heard whispers that the Red Army was less than a day out, perhaps less than that if they managed to punch through whatever meager defenses the Wehrmacht cobbled together more easily than expected. The Germans would take what they could and destroy the rest. LaFontaine had nursed a deep-seated fear that in the face of Soviet advance, the Germans would either drag them with them or else shoot them. After all, if they were determined to keep their schematics and weapons of war from the Russians, surely they would be even less inclined to give over the scientist responsible for their creation. A blueprint was worth nothing next to the person who had designed it and a score of other technological wonders besides. Evidently, it had been an unfounded fear. Jollenbeck, the commandant of the camp, had not been seen on its premises for over a month, and LaFontaine wondered if he’d been killed on the front, or perhaps executed by his increasingly paranoid superiors in Berlin. Good riddance, either way. Without his direction it was left to the immediate command structure of the camp to decide what was worth taking, worth destroying, and worth leaving behind. Evidently, in the pandemonium of retreat, they’d forgotten LaFontaine entirely. They looked out the window once more. The last of the Nazi van, tanks, trucks, and personnel carriers, disappeared into the distance, slithering out of the camp’s western gate and across the Silesian countryside like a great serpent. The inmates-those who had not been shot or otherwise murdered by guardsmen in a last futile expression of rage-watched their erstwhile captors vanish, eyes cold, glad for liberation and yet desirous of a vengeance that would likely never come.

   

* * *

        

Lola Perry paced back and forth, quickly coming undone at the seams. She had been LaFontaine’s dearest friend since the days of their youth, and a fellow attendant of the university when German forces went down into Paris. When LaFontaine had received their ‘offer’ from the Nazis, Perry had insisted on accompanying them on their less-than-voluntary journey east. Despite LaFontaine’s conviction that their friend would be safer in France, they had been unable to convince their ever-doting companion. In the end, they’d rather easily convinced the Nazis that Perry was an indispensable assistant without which they could not do so much as design a lightbulb. Perry had served-ostensibly, for they did not truly need one-as LaFontaine’s secretary, and the Nazis had voiced no problem with the arrangement.

Now, the pair sat in LaFontaine’s office as night fell over the eastern front. Perry had worked herself into quite a frenzy fueled by horror stories of Soviet atrocities.

“What if they kill us all? Oh God, I’ve heard stories of what they do to people-not just soldiers, _anyone_. I can’t deal with this, it’s-no. Five years of war, five years in a _slave labor_ camp. My parents don’t even know if I’m alive. I don’t know if _they’re_ alive. My best friend-you just _killed_ a dozen people! Oh God we-“

 “Perry. _Perry!_ Calm. Down.” LaFontaine urged. “Look, no matter how bad the Russians are, they can’t be worse than the Nazis, can they? I mea-“

 “I see them! They’re here!”

LaFontaine jumped to their feet and rushed to the window. The man-one of the inmates-who’d made the announcement stood perched at the crest of the facility’s eastern fence, leaning into the wind. If he’d so much as approached it a day ago, the guards would have shot him without hesitation. True to his word, on the horizon, LaFontaine could clearly see the unmistakable forms of Soviet tanks and personnel carriers rolling slowly, purposefully towards the camp.

Behind them, Perry seemed to be on the verge of a complete nervous breakdown.

The prisoners below congregated at the fence, waving caps in the air, shouting and cheering the approach of their liberators.

LaFontaine took a deep breath. It was time to make the acquaintance of Stalin’s men.

* * *

 They’d gone down to meet the Reds, Perry trailing behind, ever ruled by caution. When the Soviet forces reached the camp, their tanks had simply born down the great fence, not fussing with gates. Their conduct towards the prisoners who welcomed them with such glee had been less than endearing. A tankist had stood on the roof of his armor, and shouted for all to disperse and ‘return to your habitations’. It was probably generous to refer to the miserable living quarters granted to the prisoners and employees of the facility as ‘habitations’, but when his first order had been ignored, he’d responded by firing a PPSh over the heads of the crowd. That drove the message home. LaFontaine had slunk back to their office, and told Perry to go to hers. There was no sense in antagonizing the new masters of the camp.

They sat in their office again now, listening to the sounds of Russian chattering below their window, the grumbling of tank engines, and occasionally, gunshots. They couldn’t imagine whom the Soviets might possibly be shooting, but the report of gunfire had tied a cold, hard knot into their gut. They remembered a whisper they’d once heard; Stalin had once issued an order, that there were ‘no Soviet prisoners of war, only traitors’. Those who surrendered were considered cowards and dealt with summarily. Much of the camp’s labor force had been composed of Soviet soldiers captured on the front. LaFontaine’s stomach turned at the thought of these poor wretches, freed from their masters at last after months or even years of toil without recompense. They would hear their mother tongue once again for the first time in so long, and await the joy of reunion with their countrymen. Then, these very same countrymen would gun them down for the crime of choosing surrender over destruction.

“Susan LaFontaine?” the voice snapped them out of their grim imaginings. They winced. They were adverse to being addressed by their given first name, and to hear it in the mouth of a stranger was especially jarring. They looked up to see a tall, nearly skeletal figure draped in a long black coat standing at the threshold of their office. His cheeks were sunken, eyes dark and cold, contrasting sharply with the pallor of his skin. The new arrival removed his peaked cap and tucked it beneath his arm. He entered the office, cleaning the mud away from his boots on the hitherto pristine carpet. LaFontaine scowled. Not waiting for a response from the doctor, he crossed the room and sat himself comfortably in a seat adjacent to theirs. “I am Grigory Zaitsev, NKVD.” He informed them, thick accent dripping from his words.

“Doctor LaFontaine” they responded, curtly.

“I am to understand that you are both an engineer and a medical doctor, correct? You are experienced in the manufacture of weapons such as tanks, rockets, and aircraft, and have designed such for the German military, correct?”

LaFontaine opened their mouth to form a response, but reigned themselves in before the words reached their lips. If these were people who would shoot their own for a failure to fight to the death, what would they do to them? They’d helped the Nazis, not with mere unskilled labor, but in the actual conception of weapons that had killed hundreds if not thousands of Soviet troops. An affirmative answer might condemn them to death. But they set their jaw. There was no use in lying. The Russians would uncover the truth one way or another. Soon they’d have access to every record the Nazis ever kept, and if there was ever a compliment owed to the Nazis, it was that they were meticulous record keepers.

“Yes, that’s all correct.”

Zaitsev stood again, a crooked smile creeping onto his thin lips. He replaced his cap. His black eyes glittered. He reached out a gnarled hand. Reluctantly, LaFontaine took it and found themselves drawn into the most brutal, crushing handshake of their lives.

“Doctor LaFontaine, you may consider yourself in the employ of the Soviet Union.”

And so it was that LaFontaine found themselves overwhelmed by a profound and devastating sense of déjà vu.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LaFontaine and Perry are French because LaFontaine is a French name (I think) and this is literally the only reason. 
> 
> Also I'll probably stop splicing random bits of foreign language into the narration like I did here because it'll probably be horrendously wrong. I know a teensy bit of German but that's it. French, Italian, Polish, and Russian are mysteries to me.


End file.
